The day before the summit, the air in the Three Gorges valley was thick with an almost unbearable tension. The entire region was a massive, fortified armed camp, a testament to the Dragon Emperor's power and his paranoia. Tens of thousands of Qing soldiers patrolled the perimeter, their bayonets fixed, their gazes sweeping the mist-shrouded mountains. The recent, bloody manhunt for the foreign ghosts had concluded, but the sense of a violated sanctuary remained. Every shadow seemed to hold a threat. The stage was meticulously prepared, a grand theater for a meeting that would shape the destiny of the world. And on that stage, the principal actors were making their final, private preparations for the drama to come.
In his central pavilion, a structure of surprising spartan elegance amidst the immense construction site, Qin Shi Huang sat in deep meditation. He was dressed in simple, dark silk robes, his posture perfect, his breathing slow and even. To any observer, he was a picture of serene, absolute control. But within his own body, a silent, desperate battle was being waged.
He was using his power, his Dragon's Spark, not to move mountains or intimidate his enemies, but to heal himself. The immense exertion of triggering the Krakatoa event had left a deep, resonant weakness in his very marrow, a wound that physical rest alone could not mend. He was forced to channel his energy inward, painstakingly sealing the micro-tears in his capillaries, calming the frantic rhythm of his own heart, and fighting back the waves of exhaustion that threatened to overwhelm him. He was projecting an image of perfect, vibrant health, but it was a costly illusion, a mask maintained by a constant, draining expenditure of his precious inner reserves.
His physical vulnerability was matched by a new, corrosive political uncertainty. The capture of the American commandos by Yuan Shikai was a tactical victory, but a strategic nightmare. He knew his Viceroy was a venomous snake, and he was now holding two fangs in reserve. Yuan had not yet officially reported the capture to the throne, keeping the prisoners as his own secret asset. QSH allowed it, for now. It was useful to let his two most powerful subordinates hold daggers to each other's throats; their mutual suspicion kept them in check. But it was a dangerous game.
He was a weakened god, preparing to meet his greatest rival, while knowing his own house was divided by serpents and that his most powerful weapon—his own supernatural vitality—was dangerously depleted. The board was set for a battle of wits, will, and deception, and for the first time in his second life, he was not entering the contest from a position of absolute strength.
Miles away, in a deep, dark, subterranean cell carved out of the rock beneath the main security barracks, Dr. Wu Jian waited. His world had shrunk to the dimensions of his small, stone prison. The light was a single, dim bulb. The air was cold and damp. His scientific mission, the culmination of a decade of secret work, was a total failure. He had been captured, his network shattered.
He had been subjected to a series of interrogations by Spymaster Shen Ke's men. They were brutally efficient, but they were professionals, not torturers, at least not yet. They used psychological pressure, sleep deprivation, and endless, circular questioning. Dr. Wu, his mind his only remaining weapon, played his role to perfection. He was the confused, terrified scholar, wrongly accused, a victim of some terrible misunderstanding. He spoke of metallurgy, of stress-tests, of his loyalty to the Emperor's vision. He revealed nothing of his true purpose, of America, of Nightingale.
But he knew it was only a matter of time. Shen Ke's men were merely the prelude. Sooner or later, the Emperor himself would come for him. And Dr. Wu feared that confrontation more than any physical torture. He had devoted his life to studying the strange energies that surrounded the Emperor. He had a terrifying, scientifically grounded suspicion that the Emperor's powers were not limited to the physical world. He feared that his enemy possessed the ability to simply reach into his mind and rip the truth from it.
His only sliver of hope was the desperate broadcast he had intercepted from the American team, 'Archimedes.' He knew they had been planning a diversion, an attack on the Hoover prison camp. He clung to the hope that this attack would still happen, that the ensuing chaos might provide him with an opportunity to escape, or at least to destroy himself before he could be made to talk. He had no idea that the team had been captured, that his last hope was already extinguished. He was a man waiting for a rescue that would never come, a ghost already in his tomb.
In another secret location, a heavily guarded holding cell within the military compound, Gunnery Sergeant Jedediah Stone and Sergeant Riley endured a different kind of imprisonment. They were not being interrogated. They were being held as a prize, a strategic asset. They were Viceroy Yuan Shikai's personal prisoners, and the guards were not Imperial soldiers, but Yuan's own hand-picked, brutally loyal Beiyang men.
They were treated harshly, their wounds untended, their rations meager. But they were being kept alive. Stone, his mind sharp despite the pain and hunger, understood their new role with perfect, grim clarity. They were no longer soldiers of the United States. They were chess pieces on a board they couldn't see, belonging to a player whose game was not against America, but against his own countrymen. They were a weapon Yuan Shikai intended to use in his own internal power struggles against Admiral Meng Tian and, if he was bold or desperate enough, against the Emperor himself.
Stone's focus was no longer on escape or reconnaissance. It was on survival, and on finding a way to turn their capture into a weapon. He spent his waking hours studying his captors, learning their routines, listening to their conversations, searching for any sign of weakness, any flicker of dissent, any crack in their loyalty to the Viceroy that he could exploit. He was a prisoner, but in his mind, he was still a commander, gathering intelligence for a future battle.
The final piece fell into place on the horizon.
A lookout on the highest peak of the Three Gorges cordon spotted it first: a smudge of smoke far to the east, where the Yangtze River broadened towards the sea. Hours later, the watchers could see it clearly. A single, sleek, fast American cruiser, painted a peacetime white but with the unmistakable lines of a warship, had detached from the Great White Fleet and was now making its way up the great river. It flew the presidential flag.
Theodore Roosevelt was arriving.
All the players, willing and unwilling, were now assembled in this remote, fortified valley. The Emperor, weakened and suspicious, preparing for a battle of wills. The spy, captured and desperate, waiting for his final interrogation. The soldiers, prisoners and pawns in a game within a game. The hostages, Hoover's team, held in their nearby camp as the ultimate leverage. And the President, steaming upriver into the heart of his rival's power, seemingly walking into a perfectly laid trap, but with gambits of his own still yet to be revealed.
The devil's chessboard was set. The two kings were about to meet. And every piece on the board was poised for the bloody, world-altering game that was about to begin.